The next time you drive to Vancouver, you may want to make a pit stop at the Othello Tunnels just before Hope.
Rambo fans are no doubt familiar with this area ,where incredible engineering meets incredible landscape.
Known as Chapman’s Gorge in Sylvester Stallone’s blockbuster film First Blood, this was where the police officer fell out of the helicopter and where Rambo clung for his life to a rock wall above the waters of the Coquihalla River.
The section of the Kettle Valley Railway between Hope and Coquihalla is called the Coquihalla Subdivision.
It was built between 1913 and 1916.
The most expensive mile (the one near the summit) cost $300,000, almost triple the average cost for railways at the time, which was $136,000 per mile.
This section of the railway consisted of 43 bridges requiring 22 million board feet of lumber, 13 tunnels and 16 snowsheds totalling two miles in length.
The tunnels got their name from Kettle Valley Railway engineer, Andrew McCulloch, who was an avid fan of William Shakespeare.
It was said he sat around the evening campfire with the railway construction workers, reciting Shakespearean poetry and used the names of characters from his plays to name stations along the Coquihalla line.
The Kettle Valley Railway was the most difficult railway in the country to operate, with rock, mud and snow slides disrupting service.
The Coquihalla section was shut down more than it operated in the first seven winters and was so hazardous that it was rumoured the trains only crossed it at night so passengers wouldn’t be terrified by the canyons far below.
The railway provided both freight and passenger service between the Kootenays and the Coast for 48 years.
Eventually, better roads and air travel took their passengers away.
In November 1959, heavy rains washed out sections of the Coquihalla line and the damage was never repaired. In 1961, this section of the railway was officially closed.
This incredibly scenic section of the old railway line is now a popular place for hikers, cyclists and movie producers.
To watch a video of the tunnels and to discover other interesting day trips in our area, go online to teresathetraveler.ca.
Follow Othello Road for a few minutes until you pass the Tunnels Campground and come to a fork in the road.
Take the left turn, which brings you to Tunnels Road and there you will find the parking lot.
The tunnels are located in the Coquihalla Canyon Provincial Park.
A 15- to 20-minute walk down the trail will bring you to the tunnels, which are open from April to October.
If you continue along Othello Road to Hope, you will cross the famous bridge where, the First Blood film, the sheriff dropped Rambo off, telling him to leave town.
The bridge was replaced with a new one in 2011.
